🚀 go-pugleaf

-From: pcs@m-net.ann-arbor.mi.us (Paul Schuytema)
-Subject: {pace power systems
-Date: 19 Dec 92 17:50:38 GMT

-Call for help:
-I am a freelance writer and I am currently working
-on an article for Omni on space power systems.
-I am interested in solar, nuclear, and other power
-systems which will be used for basic power
-(life support, computers, etc.) for manned missions,
-especially such things as space stations, Mars runs,
-and deep space xplorations.  I am interested not only in what
-is currently being developed, but also "far flung" ideas.
-I would like to correspond with interested researchers and
-elp.

Just to mention a few of the less obvious systems:

Solar Power: photovoltaic systems are fairly well known, but solar thermal
systems less so. They typically would use huge lightweight mirror systems
to concentrate sunlight, and use the concentrated energy (plus a heat sink)
to drive a heat engine, usually a mechanical closed-cycle device (Stirling
cycle).

Nuclear power: RTGs (radioisotope thermal generators) are fairly common,
and nuclear fission is sometimes used. In both cases, I believe the mechanism
is heat used to operate a thermocouple (inefficient, but there's plenty of
power available). The Atomic Energy Commission used to study a system I haven't
heard about in years - a nuclear battery that uses beta decay (I think) to
generate thousands of volts at perhaps a few microamperes.

Magnetic effects: for spacecraft in non-polar orbit around the Earth, it's
possible to interact with the Earth's magnetic field, to convert orbital
energy to electric power, or vice versa. (The latter is probably more useful -
a satellite can use solar power to boost its orbit.) The Tethered Satellite
System (TSS) recently flown aboard the Shuttle is such a device.

And of course the "futuristic" possibilities include fusion, matter-antimatter
reactions, interactions with the sun's magnetic field or the solar wind,
and power beamed from the Earth or some other site via laser or microwaves.

If you get your article published, please post the date of the issue it's
in - I'd like to see that.

John Roberts
roberts@cmr.ncsl.nist.gov